The Cutest Basketball Kid Ever

Maybe I'm biased...OK, I'm definitely biased, but Kindergartners are the cutest basketball players, ever! David has had 3 practices so far. He may not be very good, but he is sure having fun doing it. Here's just a glimpse.

My first Vlog

As happens every Christmas season, things get super busy.  Christmas programs, parties and gifts take center stage.  Sometimes it takes something like a snow day to get us to slow down.  Today was such a day.  It gave me time to upload some videos from my new Flip HD camera.  I ordered this on Black Friday and just got it this week.  So I thought it would be a treat to show you some of the first videos taken with this (and highlight my kids at the same time).

Last night, amid the snow and slush coming down, our church had it's children's Christmas program.  Here are some videos from this.  The first one is the 4-5 year old choir.  David is the little wiseman on the front with a green robe and a crown (as a bonus, you'll hear one of our choir moms singing "Silent Night" in German).

Since he's so cute, they decided to let him have a mic twice!!  Here he is again (I'm new at the video thing so you'll probably want to fast forward about a minute and a half to get to the singing).

My last video is of the song where Julie had a solo.  She is one at the mic on the left (the last of the 4 soloists).

Hope you enjoyed my first vlog post.  I hope to have more of those in the future.

How I'm Going to Get a Free DSi for Christmas Part 2

If you'll remember from Part 1 of this post, I told you that I am working hard to earn Amazon gift cards.  I'm going to use those to buy a DSi for my daughter for Christmas - all for FREE!!!

I told you about the survey companies I use and how I have earned $125 from them over the past 6 months.

Now I'd love to tell you about the other way I earn money online:

2.  Point Reward Websites
Point Reward websites let you earn points in a variety of ways.  You then trade your points for rewards, i.e. Amazon gift cards.  I have used several of these sites in the past, but currently only use 2 (these websites can be time consuming, so use your own judgment about how many you join).

Swagbucks
Swagbucks is a really fun site.  Its main function is as a search engine.  Periodically as you search you are awarded Swagbucks, usually 8-10 of them.  When you get 450 Swagbucks, you earn a $5 Amazon card.  You can redeem 5 of these a month.  Incidentally, there are a lot of different gift cards you can choose as well but I've only ever done the Amazon ones.

There are so many ways to earn Swagbucks on the site, I can't even begin to tell you all of them.  You can answer surveys, shop through their site (earn 2 Swagbucks per dollar spent), join services like Netflix, or watch commercials and answer questions about them.  That's just to name a few.  This is a fun, easy way to earn some Amazon dollars.  I've made $100 through Swagbucks so far.  Interested?  Join here.

My Points
This is my favorite site.  I just love My Points.  Just as in Swagbucks, there are a variety of ways to earn points through My Points.  They send you multiple emails a day.  Just clicking through the emails to the site advertised gives you 5 points.  Do what they ask on the site and you can earn anywhere from 25 to 2000 points.  Shop through My Points and earn 2 to 8 points per dollar spent (I do all my shopping through My Points because I feel I get rewarded more through them then through Swagbucks).  My Points also has a search feature that earns points.  Possibly my favorite part is that My Points connects up with Coupons.com.  You can print coupons from My Points and earn points both for printing and redeeming them.

My Points offers many different gift cards as rewards.  Find ones for popular stores and restaurants, including - you guessed it - Amazon.  So far I've earned $125 worth of gift cards - a $25 Amazon card, a $50 Amazon card, a $25 Kohls card and a $25 CVS card.

So there you have it, over the past 6 months or so, I've earned $125 from doing surveys and $225 from using rewards websites - plenty enough for a pink DSi :).

Hard Questions

So David asks me casually today...

"Mommy, can Santa die?"

Wow, what a charged question!!  How in the world do I answer this?  I don't want him to think Santa is invincible or immortal and thus put Santa at the same level as Jesus, but I also don't want him to think Santa's life is in danger. 

(Incidentally, these kinds of questions might be why my parents never "did" Santa with us.  Don't get me wrong, they didn't come right out and say Santa doesn't exist, they just never encouraged it.  We never wrote letters to Santa or left cookies out for him.  We did have unwrapped presents every Christmas, but they left it up to us to decide who we thought those were from.)

My kids, unlike me, are die-hard Santa believers.  So that brings me back to the question.  How do I answer this 5 year old's question?  I decided to do what all good moms do when asked something I don't know a hard question.  I said  "What do you think?"

He impressed me and said "Yes, I think Santa can die.  Only God can't die.  He better be careful on Christmas Eve then, huh!"

Ah, I could breathe easy again....until the next time.

What about you?  What would you have answered? 

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas